Gio • Thursday 10:12 am

"Lucas..."  I say, drawing his name out and locking eyes with him in the rearview. He tries to cover it up, but I've already seen it out.  "That's it! Give it to me."

He doesn't respond, and I'm seconds away from pulling the car over because I thought I made myself clear this morning. I reach my arm back, my palm face up. "Put it in my hand right now. I see it, and I know it's turned on."

"Come on!" he protests from the backseat, flushing. He knows I've caught him red-handed. "I'll put it back in my pants. I promise I won't touch it for the next twenty minutes."

My eyebrows fly up, along with my temper. "For twenty minutes? You have zero self-control!"

"It's fine. Just let him play with it when we're in the car, Gio," Ren says. She's way too easygoing about everything. Always giving in to what he wants.

"No," I grit. "He's always got that damn thing in his hand, Bella. He's addicted!"

Ren rolls her eyes and turns her head to the window, and I look back to see Lucas cross his arms.

"I am not," he mutters, bristling.

"Yes, you are. Give it to me. No more phone today, Lucas," I say, putting my foot down metaphorically and physically as I press down on the gas, the speedometer rising. "Today we are seeing Italy, damn it!"

"But what if I want to take photos? I won't keep checking it, Dad. I promise," he says before returning his eyes to the screen. "I just need to do one more thing, and then I'll put it away. Give me one second."

"I'm going to chuck that phone right out the window in a second!"

Fucking smartphones are turning us into dopamine junkies!  When I was his age, staring out the window during a car ride was what we did! That was my 'screen.' We're forgetting how to simply be bored and alone with our thoughts—always feeling the urge to get a quick digital hit. He can't see it. I'm just trying to protect him from this slippery slope...and I'll do it... even if that means he hates me a little for it.

"Shhh," Ren soothes me and then turns to our son. "Lucas, give it to me. I'll put it in my purse, and you can take photos on my phone. I'll airdrop them to you later, okay?"

"Fucking fine," he mutters, reluctantly placing it into her hand.

I raise my eyebrows. "What was that?"

"God. Nothing!" he groans theatrically and drops his head into his hands.

"Watch your language, Lucas," Ren gently reminds him.

His head whips back up. "But Dad swears all the time!"

I bite back a curt remark and instead inhale deeply and blow a lung full of tension through my lips. This is supposed to be a fucking FUN family trip, damn it!

My hands slide up and down the soft black leather steering wheel of my father's Alpha Romeo. Tranquil thoughts, I remind myself. I focus my attention out to the horizon. Not a cloud in the sky. The open farmland, punctuated sporadically with trees and villas, whiz by as I speed down the A4 on our way to Venice. My family and I arrived in Italy from California ten days ago, and so far, it's been anything but a vacation. We've been stuck at my Grandfather's Lake House on Lake Garda since we landed. It's large, expensive, and beautiful there as all fuck, but I've been sitting with lawyers, going over the fine details of his estate for days, and it's been absolutely exhausting.

Unfortunately, my grandfather, whom I never knew very well, passed away last month. Last weekend, we attended his funeral at a magnificent cathedral in Milan—a city where my grandfather had devoted many years of his career as the CEO of a major Italian bank. It was a grand public gathering, and judging by the large turnout, it seemed to hold great significance for not only my family but also for the community.

All that to say, I've been looking forward to this trip all week. To finally get out and explore with my family. But instead of enjoying being out in the world, my son wants to dive back into the little dark hole of his online teen world. Fuck that.

Bella puts her hand up to the back of my neck and gently brushes my freshly shaved hairline with her fingertips, my tension subsiding with each stroke and a tingly rush replacing it. After sixteen years of marriage, she always knows just what I need physically to even me out emotionally. I drop my right hand to her exposed thigh and give it a squeeze.

"Can you guys not with all the PDA?" Lucas mutters. "I wish you would have just left me with Nonno and gone by yourselves."

"No. You would just sit around and be glued to your phone all the time. We are in Italy, and you need to see some of it. Plus," I lower my voice, "Nonno is not well right now. You know that."

My father lives with bipolar disorder, as do I. We've both been pretty stable for a long time, each of us having found the medications and self-care routines that work best for us. But losing both his parents in the span of a year really did him in. When we arrived, he was completely off his medication, and even now that he's back on, signs of early-onset dementia are getting worse, making figuring out what to do next that much harder.

We drive over the long bridge connecting Venice to the mainland and then straight over to Piazzale Roma. I drop Ren and Lucas off with our luggage near the Constitution Bridge by the dock for the Vaporetto and drive off to attempt to find parking in the San Marco garage. After fifteen minutes of circling, I finally find one and hurry to get back to my family.

Dashing out the exit doors, I collide straight into an older couple. Everyone seems alright at first, but as I look into the old woman's eyes, she gasps, bringing a hand to her mouth, and drops her bag like I'm some sort of ghost.

"Mi scusi, Signora. Scusa," I say, putting my hands together in prayer apologetically.

The woman stares at me with such intensity that my heart skips once. Though her face has wrinkled with time, no one could say she is not still beautiful. Her bobbed gray hair is coiffed in effortless waves, and from her pearl necklace to the rich silk of her navy blouse, every item she wears drips with apparent wealth.

The gentleman, who is at least in his sixties, hair gone white, steadies her with his arm. He's wearing a six-piece suit so rich and black that it threatens to suck up the very daylight; his crisp white collar a stark, near-blinding contrast. His eyes widen and blink a few times, and then his icy blue eyes narrow and rake over me.

"Cazzo!" Shock covers his face. "Giovanni? Non puoi essere tu! Sei troppo giovane," he gasps, saying it can't be because I'm too young.

What the fuck is this guy going on about? Wait. How does he know my name? 

I've sharpened my Italian over the years, but maybe somehow I'm misinterpreting. I'll ask if I know them. "Vi conosco?"

He shakes his head as if he still can't believe what he's seeing. Then his thoughts seem to drift away as he looks far off over my shoulder to the high mountains in the distance before his iceberg eyes slowly crash back into mine. "Sei imparentato con Giovanni Russo?"

Am I related to a Giovanni Russo? I shake my head. "No."

So weird, though. That's my mother's last name. But I've never gone by her last name, and I don't know anyone else that does.

"Asso?" the elegant older woman asks me breathlessly. And fuck if the way her eyes dive into mine isn't surreal. She seems to be begging for me to remember who she is, but I just can't place her.

"Asso Pazzo," the man snips, correcting her.

Pazzo is Italian for crazy. Crazy Asso? What is Asso?

"No, sorry, non me," I reply in half-English.

The edges of my stomach curl with an eerie feeling, and I gingerly take a step to pass the motionless couple. Whoever this man is, I don't want to be mixed up in his business. 

Just when I think I've made my exit, my body locks as the man suddenly seizes me by the arm. I whip around to see him open his coat and reveal an imposing silver handgun. My heart comes to a skidding stop.

"Not so fast," he says in English, still grasping my arm.

"Why? Wha-what's going on?" I stammer, my pulse now hammering in my chest. "I said I don't know you! Or, or, whoever you think I am!"

"Lo so," he all but whispers, his eyes flicking like lasers between mine, scanning me like a barcode. "But I've been looking for someone for a long time, and I'm close."

The hissed animosity in his last words chill me to the bone. "What do you mean? You have the wrong guy!"

"You must be related to him!" he snaps, gripping me tighter. "What's your name?"

"Giovanni Regali."

"Regali?" I can see his brain zeroing in on the name, and my hope that this is all some sort of mixup is rapidly dissolving. "As in Franco Regali?"

"Yeah?" I hesitantly confirm, elongating the vowel. "He's my grandfather."

"And his only son, Carlo Regali, is your father? Hmm," he muses, "I guess I've never seen a picture..."

Yeah, cause my family pays the newspaper to keep my father's antics out of it. Fuck! What has my dad done now to anger a guy like this? I don't answer and narrow my eyes.

He ticks his head just one degree to the left, but the movement causes my ass to clench. I take a steadying breath. "Okay, yeah, he's my father, but what is this all about?"

"Dio," he whispers the word, weightlessly like vapor. 

The wrinkles around his eyes make way as his lids retract wide. The pupil of his icy irises sharpen like a cat. I can see the gears of his brain rotate slowly and then freeze as they click into place. He lets go of my arm and smooths the fabric back down. "Le mie più sincere scuse, Giovanni. Your grandfather was a great man. We..." His lips curl into a smile. "Did some great business together."

My eyes narrow again at his sudden shift in mood. "And you are?"

"Cavolo! Where are my manners?" He lays his hand on his chest. "I am Santino Mastini, and this is my wife, Serena."

He gestures to his wife a few steps back. For a moment, I had forgotten she was even there. My eyes meet hers again, and in that split second, if she could have undressed me with them right then and there, she would have. But a heartbeat later, she drops her gaze, a faint blush rising under her heavy foundation. Santino puts his wife's arm through his.

"Allora, look at the time. We must be going. Give my regards to your father." With that, he pulls out his cell phone and dials a number. Then, he presses the phone to his ear as they saunter off.

What the actual fuck.

As I slowly walk back to the spot where I dropped my family off, my head swims with fluid thoughts and emotions that are too slippery to hold on to. I blink to refocus my eyes and see my wife holding onto the brim of her straw hat, waving her arm above her head amongst the crowd by the dock.

"Gio! I was so worried. What took you so long?" Bella asks, her beautiful dark brown hair dancing lightly around her shoulders as she walks to meet me halfway.

"Oh, uh, parking was insane and, um..." my brow pinches together as I try to decide what to tell her. But I'm not even sure what just happened back there.

"Is everything okay, baby? You look concerned," she says, rubbing my shoulder.

"I... I ran into a couple on my way out of the parking garage. They..." I bring my eyes to meet hers—to help convey what my words can't. "Bella, they thought they knew me."

She tilts her head, tuning in to me more precisely. "Someone from California?"

"No, they were... they knew my grandfather."

"Oh!" She visibly relaxes. "You saw the size of the funeral. Lots of people know your grandfather. You probably even shook hands with them there and don't remember." A rumbling motor grows louder, and Ren's eyes flick up."Yay! Here's the next Vaporetto!"

Before I can elaborate further, she flies back to Lucas, sitting on our luggage, and I don't miss the discreet handoff. 

Lucas has been on his phone again! Ugh!! I don't know why it irks me so much, but it just does.

We board the private Vaporetto and tell the driver we are staying at the Aman. The driver nods, handling our luggage with the utmost care, and helps us board the boat, making sure to earn a generous tip. Ten minutes later, we step off onto a small tiled landing, and a host escorts us under an arch into the ultra-swanky five-star hotel.

The front desk informs us our room will not be ready for another few hours, so we walk through the decadent lobby to the street side. As we wander the ancient, narrow, maze-like alleys Venice calls streets, a chill passes through me several times—like an unwelcome February breeze on this hot August day—and the unnerving sensation settles in my core.

I'm being followed.

I don't mention this to Bella. As I've said, I've lived with bipolar most of my life, and she has known me for nearly half of that. I've been paranoid before, and she'll become concerned. But I have been feeling surprisingly stable these last two weeks, considering everything. Stress, a long plane flight, and the time change can sometimes trigger a small hypomanic episode in me, so we upped my medication slightly in anticipation, and it seems to have worked so far. This doesn't feel like manic paranoia. This feels different.

As we finish eating and head off again to see San Marco, the distinctive feeling that I'm being watched keeps pinging me in the pit of my stomach. I keep my guard up and steal quick glances behind—expecting any moment to find that old gentleman tailing me or... someone else. But as far as I can tell, no one ever looks overly suspicious. But still, it's there—deep in my gut.

And if there is one thing you should know about me...

My gut is never wrong.

https://youtu.be/ba1ai4TEsts